Fading Twilight
by breakaway-republic
Summary: Suzuka's past as an assassin is catching up with her, and it could have dire consequences for the rest of the Outlaw Star crew.
1. Vengence

***Disclaimer: I don't own Outlaw Star. It is property of the Sunrise/Sotsu agency. While I'm at it, I might as well cover all of my bases and inform you that I can't take credit for Semtex, either***   
  


Young Ceasar Dvorak was excited. He was a few days away from graduating school. Granted he wasn't graduating with honors, but his father was very proud of him. For once, somebody in the family would have a brighter future, his father kept telling him. Ceasar would be the first one in his family to graduate. He smiled as the fading rays of the sun shone down on him during the long walk from school. His father wasn't a rich man, but for graduation night, the two of them and his kid sister, Natalya, would be going to the fanciest resturant on Morenci-9. Of course, Natalya was very smart, and it was more than likely she would be graduating with honors in a few years, but this was his moment. Ceasar looked at his watch. Hopefully his father wouldn't be too upset with him for lingering after school to play one last pick-up game of football with his classmates. 

The assassin stood over the corpse of Nestor Dvorak, and kicked the smoking pistol away from his body as a precaution. At first, the man didn't look that dangerous, but nearly everyone on the frontier worlds kept some sort of firearm within reach. The assassin stared back at the two bullet holes in the wall- that was entirely too close for comfort. Nestor's partner was nowhere to be seen. The assassin was wondering what to do next when the door to the house opened and closed. It might be Nestor's partner. 

"Poppa! I'm home!" A voice called out . 

Twilight Suzuka tightened her grip on the bokken.   
  


Something wasn't right. It was entirely too quiet Ceasar thought as he walked in. It's just too quiet and drafty in here. 

"Hello? Dad?! Are you here?" he asked. He made his way through the kitchen. He wasn't downstairs. Nothing really seemed amiss, just so very quiet. But some morbid urge compelled Ceasar to head upstairs and check the hallway. As soon as he reached the top stair, he saw his father laying face-down in a pool of blood on the floor. 

"Poppa? Oh no.....God no" It felt like all the life had been sucked out of Ceasar. Everything seemed like it was in slow motion. He ran to his father. 

"Poppa? Speak to me...please. Come on....you'll be okay" He checked for a pulse and there was none. Suddenly Ceasar noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. Standing in front of the open window at the end of the hall was a tall dark-haired woman in a flowing white kimono. She couldn't have been much older than him. She loosely held onto a wooden sword in her right hand and surveyed the scene with a degree of deja-vu. Ceasar started to pick up his father's body, and the assassin was caught off guard by what happened next. 

"Help me....please! My father's been hurt. It looks real bad...." he pleaded to the assassin. 

Time seemed to freeze- Suzuka's kimono flapped in the breeze that was coming in through the window. It slowly was dawning that the woman Ceasar was staring at was the one who did this to this father. There was no time to fear for his own life, because in the blink of an eye, Suzuka was out the window and gone. But he could never forget that face.   
  


FOUR YEARS LATER   
  


Ceasar Dvorak had arranged for a meeting with the Singh brothers at one of the more upscale Chinese restaurants in Heiphong. They didn't know him very well, but they had a job offer for him. Ceasar had pretty much accepted the offer but still wanted to meet and haggle over the price and ask for more specifics. Since they were footing the bill, he figured the least he could do was show up early. Ceasar had ordered a bottle of Quilmes beer and a small bowl of soup when they finally arrived. As per request of the 2 remaining Singh brothers, Hans and Nils, Ceasar showed up unarmed. He only had with him a cellphone and his trenchcoat when their bodyguards searched him. The Singh brothers had more protection than the Viceroy of Heiphong as a general rule, although only three bodyguards had accompanied them to the resturant that night. 

"So, do you always hire outside help to kill the last assassin whose services you've used?" Ceasar asked Hans bluntly. 

"No, that's not the case..." Nils said defensively 

"What my brother is trying to say is that this particular assassin has become less reliable over time." Hans calmly explained. "She flatly refused us on our last offer- not very typical of her. We fear that she may become a liability in the long run. It's almost as if she's lost her stomach for that line of work." 

"That bitch may be trying to blackmail us." Nils added 

"I see" Ceasar nodded "So you and her must go back a ways..." 

"Quite some time" Hans said. 

Ceasar cracked a smile. Keep talking, assholes he said to himself. They were practically confessing to hiring the kimono-clad assassin to kill his father. "It seems like you've got plenty of men to spare. Why not send one of them after her?" 

"You have to understand" Hans continued. "She may have lost her touch, but she's still a very dangerous adversary. If something should go wrong, we wouldn't want it to be traced back to us." 

"What do you think will happen when you shoot at the devil in the back and miss?" Nils added testily. The younger, whiny sycophant Singh brother was really starting to get on Ceasar's nerves. "We've given you all of the neccecary information about your target, Mr. Dvorak. Now we need your answer." 

Ceasar paused, not wanting to look too eager to take on the job. 

"It's a deal" he said, reaching across the table to shake the elder Sing brother's hand, but giving Nils a wide berth. He noticed a Daewoo pistol in a holster underneath Hans' coat. "Of course, I'll need 70,000 Wong up front". The 2 brothers looked at each other, nonverbally agreeing that it was a fair price. Ceasar proceeded to dial up his account number on the cellphone so that Hans could electronically transfer the funds. 

"By the way, have either of you two been to Morenci-9?" Ceasar asked matter-of-factly. 

"Morenci-9?" Nils asked. 

"Yeah; little copper-mining planet out past Farfallas? I grew up there." 

"We have some business interests there, but we haven't been there ourselves" Hans spoke up. "Most of the casings from our munitions come from there". 

"Now that you mention it, we had some trouble with smugglers out there a few years back" Nils said- more to his brother than Ceasar. 

Hans handed the cellphone back to Ceasar. The display read DEPOSIT VERIFIED: 70,000W. Even Nils wouldn't be stupid enough to blurt out which smugglers they killed on Morenci-9 four years ago. If Ceasar was going to do this, now was the time. Too bad the entree hadn't arrived... 

He stood up and slipped out of his coat, handing it to one of the bodyguards. 

"Could you place this on the coat rack up front?" He asked the guard. 

The bodyguard nodded and walked away with his coat. He was probably used to doing some menial chores for the Singh brothers and their clients and associates. Ceasar waited until the bodyguard was a relatively safe distance away and then pressed a button on the cellphone. 

The trenchcoat, which had a thin layer of Semtex explosive sewn into the lining, blew up in the bodyguard's arms, and he disappeared in a red mist. The second one, standing a few feet away along with some businessmen who were having dinner at the wrong place and at the wrong time, were knocked almost clear across the resturant from the force of the blast. The booth offered both Ceasar and the Singh brothers some protection from the blast, but neither Nils or Hans were prepared for what was about to happen. 

Ceasar grabbed the knife with the 6-inch blade that he had taped under his side of the table during lunch earlier that day, stood up and plunged the knife straight down into the spot between Hans' neck and collarbone. As Hans let out a startled gasp, Ceasar pulled his body closer and took the Daewoo pistol out Hans' holster. Nils could only watch in horror as the blood drained from his brother's body and Hans tried feebly to pull the knife from his neck- his assailant had struck an artery on his first try. Ceasar flipped the safety off of the pistol and shot the remaining bodyguard twice as he finally turned his attention away from the explosion and towards his employers. He then roughly shoved Hans' dying body onto his younger brother and the two of them landed in an awkward heap in the corner of the resturant's booth. 

The horrified expression didn't leave Nils' face. He was almost flat on his back and fumbling around for something- probably a gun of his own- when he saw Ceasar standing over him. Nils was looking down the barrel of his bother's pistol. 

"You stupid bastard, you have NO idea who you're dealing with! 150,000 Wong to kill Twilight Suzuka? I would've done it for free!" 

"No! Not you..." Nils now had an idea of who Ceasar was..... 

"This is for my father!" Ceasar gritted his teeth, exhaled and pulled the trigger. 

He put another bullet in the back of Hans' skull- after all, he didn't want any nasty surprises when his back was turned- then pulled the bloody knife out of Hans' neck, and started wiping it off with a cloth napkin before putting it back into an improvised sheath sewn onto his pants. 

The men who had ordered the death of his father were now lying in a bloody, lifeless heap in the far corner of the resturant. It was all over in a few seconds, and it certainly wasn't as exhilarating as he thought it would be. However, beside the 70,000 Wong deposit into his bank account, the Singh brothers had given Ceasar what he considered the greatest gift of all- a detailed dossier on Twilight Suzuka, the woman who killed his father. 

The scared survivors regarded Ceasar with fear as he calmly walked to the cashier. He had removed the magazine from the pistol and had pulled the slide back all the way, jamming a lacquered chopstick into the eject port and rendering the gun temporarily inoperable. He hated guns. 

After tossing the Daewoo on the floor, he paid the terrified clerk 8.50 Wong for his beer and soup and walked out into the night. It was a chilly night. Ceasar didn't have his jacket, but he didn't mind.   
  


Several blocks away, under the bright neon lights of the Odessa Casino, Suzuka was making a killing. The world had an odd rose-colored hue through her eyes, and it didn't have anything to do with the 33,907 Wong she accumulated in just under a half hour. She had picked up on the management's patterns for nearly every slot machine, roulette wheel and dealer. It was almost too easy. The cashier at the window put her ill-gotten earnings into an attache case and handed it over to her. Suzuka took it, and almost reluctantly headed up to the manager's office. 

"How did you do?" the manager asked as she handed over the attache case. 

"Almost 35,000 Wong." Suzuka remarked 

"What?!" The manager looked very disappointed and angry. He thought his security system was sound enough to detect losses like that. "You've been on the floor for just over 20 minutes. How is that possible?" he asked as he started counting the money. 

To answer his question, she produced a pair of loaded dice from her white kimono and then removed a pair of rose-hued contact lens from her eyes. The casino's assistant manager was testing one of the dice with a caliper as Suzuka explained to them that the pink tint on the contacts allowed the wearer to pick up nearly any type of marking on the back of a playing card, no matter how subtle. 

"You've invested a lot to counter some of the more high-tech grifters and con men, and it is quite effective against those methods, but you're establishment is still vulnerable to some of these old tricks that have been around for centuries." she said. 

Suzuka couldn't believe it. Upon returning from the Leiline, she made up her mind that she would stay with Gene, Jim, Melfina and Aisha a little longer-an odd group indeed. Now, she had found work as a professional "High Roller". She had approached the management of the Odessa Casino a week ago and with an attache case of close to a quarter-million Wong and explained how she had basically robbed them blind and proposed that she help overhaul their security. Now she was basically pulling in a six-figure salary by just gambling and relaying to the management her observation on the strengths and weaknesses of their security system. And they certainly were getting their money's worth out of her. No one back home knew what she was doing, as far as they all knew, she was still in the assassination game. Suzuka was a little bemused- it was only the second time in her life she felt as though she could refer to a place as "home". 

This was so much better than killing for a living. There was still some uncertainty about her future, since as well as the Odessa Casino was paying her, it was only a temporary job. In the back of her mind, she knew she could always move on if everyone back at Starwind and Hawking Enterprises stopped being of interest to her, but she had to admit that wasn't going to happen anytime soon. It was almost like a close knit- but constantly bickering- family.   
  


Ceasar had made his way back from the resturant to his apartment for a change of clothes. The night still was fairly cold, and in addition to another jacket, he needed a clean change of clothes. Some blood spilled on his shirt in the resturant, apparently Hans'. He had been in the business for nearly three and a half years now. His specialty was sabotage, making specailly shaped explosive charges to cripple or destroy spacecraft, but he also had a penchant for bladed weapons and could create traps with either better than any of his competition. He tried not to think about how many people were on the ships he had destroyed over the years, or how many countless hours of toil and TLC his victims had lavished on their vessels. Most of his targets were merchants and occasionally other assasins. He became what he had loathed- but he saw it only as a means to an end. 

"You're a mess!" He said to his reflection in the mirror over the sink as he wiped off the blood. "But that's OK, you should see the other guys." 

He looked himself over in the mirror after cleaning himself off and then packed up an assortment of both high-tech and low-tech toys. How long had it been? Four years? A place called Starwind and Hawking was the address that was in the Singh brother's file on her. It was unlike her to stay in one place for so long. This was the closest she had to a permanent address in quite awhile. Time to pay a visit to Twilight Suzuka's new home. 


	2. Assassin's Reunion

Aisha woke up out of a sound sleep. Despite the sizeable dinner she put away earlier that night, she was still pretty hungry. She'd been around the Terrans long enough to get out of the habit sleeping in her uniform and had taken to sleeping in a white nightie. Somebody's out there, she realized as her ears twitched. Maybe it was Suzu coming back late again. Aisha reluctantly slipped out of bed and stuck her head out in the hallway. 

"Suzu? Is that you?" She drowsily asked. She was now getting a scent and realized it wasn't her. 

For Ceasar Dvorak, getting into Starwind and Hawking enterprises was fairly easy. He just put some tape along a window pane on the ground floor and firmly knocked the pane of glass out. Some older wooden training swords as well as a small library of different martial-arts techniques in her room was proof enough for Ceasar that Twilight Suzuka resided here. However, now that he was almost face-to-face with a Ctarl Ctarl, getting out would prove to be a lot more difficult. 

"Hey! You're not Suzuka! What the hell are you doing here?" Aisha asked, now wide awake. 

"I..I...I....uhhhhh" Ceasar stammered. Shit! He was just here to recon the place, now his plans were ruined unless.... 

"Answer me! Who are you?" She yelled. 

Ceasar started backing away. Dammit, he cursed himself. The file briefly mentioned something about Suzuka being in the company of a Ctarl woman, but he didn't think much of it. He did a mental inventory of what he had on him that could stand up against a Ctarl Ctarl and wondered if he would have a chance to use it. 

Suddenly, a small sleepy figure stepped in between the two of them, oblivious to Ceasar's presence. Jim was up late working on the accounts when he fell asleep, only to be awaken by Aisha's yelling. 

"What's going on Aisha?" Jim asked 

"Jim! Get back....." she started to warn, but it was too late. Ceasar grabbed the boy and pressed a knife to his throat. 

"Step back or I kill the kid!" Ceasar yelled. 

Aisha growled. Using a boy as a shield- damn coward! She didn't step back like Ceasar ordered, but she didn't want to risk Jim's neck, so she stayed put as Ceasar started backing away. 

He had managed to get as far as the front door with Jim in tow. Aisha had followed cautiously. She knew that the intruder would have one hand on either Jim or the knife and be using one hand to try and open the door. Her best bet was to wait until he tried opening the door before making her move. 

However, Ceasar knew this also. He let Aisha come a few feet closer- she would have to be pretty close for this diversion to work. Instead of trying to open the door, he held the knife to the boy's throat in one hand and fished something out of his pocket in the other. It was something he was hoping to save for later on, but in his current predicament it could buy him precious seconds and possibly take care of a big obstacle. Ceasar pulled the pin on his customized grenade- a very nasty little cocktail that mixed Semtex with nitrate and regular black powder for the primer and was packed with metal shards made from a Dragonite alloy- designed to take care of either the spaceship or knock down the wall of any building that Suzuka would be in. Instead, he dropped it into Jim's jacket pocket, then roughly shoved the boy towards Aisha. Aisha caught Jim and immediately scooped the grenade out of his pocket. She was looking at it, trying to weigh her options- she knew she only had a few seconds. 

Aisha turned around and was about to tell Jim to stand back when he saw that Gene and Melfina were now by his side. She was going to pitch the grenade back at the intruder, but now there was no time for any of the others to get to safety. 

"What the hell's going on here?" Gene asked. 

"I'm not sure, Gene. It seems an intruder has....." the little pink Gillium can on the table, no longer on Standby mode, started to say. 

Aisha didn't say anything. Instead she tucked the grenade close to her body and threw herself onto the ground facing away from them. This is going to hurt, she told herself, but with the others standing so close, she didn't have much choice. 

There was a muffled explosion and Aisha was airborne for a few seconds before tumbling for a few feet. The others winced, unaware that Ceasar was still standing in the doorway watching the whole spectacle unfold. He let out a surprised gasp as the Ctarl woman slowly got to her feet and started shuffling towards him- then he smiled when he got a good view of her. His customized grenade actually worked. 

"HEY!" Gene yelled out. He trained his gun on the shadowy figure in the doorway. 

Ceasar was brought back to reality as two bullets glanced off the metal doorway he was standing in. He reached into his coat and flung a throwing knife in Gene's direction before leaving the building. There was a *clink* as the knife lodged itself into the smoking barrel of Gene's pistol. He pulled the trigger again the gun jumped out of his hands and onto the floor with the bullet stuck in the chamber. 

"OH NO! AISHA!" Jim yelled. After taking two more wobbly steps, she had collapsed facedown on the floor, and Jim and Melfina ran to her. Gene didn't understand what all the commotion was until the two of them gently rolled Aisha over. Aisha was bleeding- badly. Strangely, it didn't hurt- she had opened her mouth and was trying to tell them to stop making such a big fuss, but was only able to cough up blood. The explosion also ripped the front of her nightie to shreds. Jim removed his jacket and placed it over her- partly to preserve her modesty and keep her from going into shock, but mostly because he was beside himself seeing her in such bad shape. 

"Gillium! Give us directions to the nearest hospital!!" Gene shouted out as he helped Jim and Melfina load the injured Ctarl Ctarl into Ehefrau. 

"Very well- the vehicle's console should now be displaying a map with the quickest route." 

"Hang in there Aisha....you'll be OK" Jim tried reassuring her as he and Mel held onto her hand. Their only response was a faint-sounding "...mrrrow?" as Jim's jacket was now covered in more of her blood and more Ctarl B was pouring from the corner of her mouth. As Melfina and Jim tired keeping her conscious, Gene got behind the wheel of Ehefrau and the four of them sped off into the night. 

Close to an hour later, Suzuka could sense that something was amiss from a block away. The door to Starwind and Hawking Enterprises was wide open, the lights were on and there was the faint smell of explosive in the air. And blood, but she didn't see this until she was in the front door. There was a small crater on the floor and a trail of blood that trailed from it for a few feet, where it turned into a large puddle. One of Gene's pistols was on the floor with the hilt of a small knife sticking out of the barrel. 

The pink Gillium can was on it's side on the table. 

"Gillium- what happened?" she asked as she set it upright. 

"An intruder broke into our offices earlier tonight. Aisha confronted the intruder and was injured. The others took her to the hospital." 

"What?" That was Aisha's blood on the floor? She couldn't believe it. "How?" 

"Apparently with an explosive device. The others were unable to get to a safe distance in time, so Aisha placed herself on top of it. The events transpired quite rapidly, and I was in Standby mode for part of the time, so I still am uncertain what else precisely happened". 

"Did you see who did this? What about the others?" 

"To the best of my knowledge, the others are fine, however I have not had contact with them since they left for the hospital. If you would like, I can show you the same route that I gave them." 

"Yes, by all means, show me." 

Suzuka caught up with the others and there was a long apprehensive wait at the emergency room of Heiphong Shock-Trauma Ward #3. After what had seemed like an eternity, a Dr. Chin emerged, holding onto a clipboard. 

"You're the ones who brought in the Ctarl Ctarl, right?" 

Gene nodded. 

"We've been able to stop the bleeding and we've removed most of the shrapnel. There was some internal bleeding also, but that's under control. She's heavily sedated, so you won't be able to talk to her for awhile." He said. It sounded like good news, but all of them felt that there was more to it. He stopped short of saying that she would be OK. "How did you say this happened?" 

"Grenade" Gene said. 

"Judging from her injuries, she must have been right on top of it." Dr Chin surmised out loud. "We removed enough shrapnel to kill anybody in a 10-meter radius. I have to tell you, the best we can do for now is keep her in Intensive care. We're not set up to treat Ctarl Ctarls here." 

"Can't you get a hold of a specialist?" Jim asked anxiously. 

"Yes, we've been in touch with one at the Ctarl Ctarl Embassy, but....." the doctor started to say. 

"But what?" Gene said. He was starting to sound testy. 

"They said it was quite rare for a Ctarl Ctarl to sustain injuries like that. Some of the shrapnel severed the nerve endings in her back. We did the best we could, but your friend may never be able to walk again." 

"What?" Suzuka asked. 

The doctor continued. That wasn't the worst of it. "They don't believe in physical therapy or prosthetics. According to what they told me, it's tradition for a Ctarl Ctarl that's become paralyzed or severely physically impaired in any way to take their own life. I was told that except for the elderly, once a Ctarl Ctarl could no longer contribute to the Empire or became a burden to their family, they're obligated to commit suicide." the doctor bluntly said. 

"No....." Jim had been fighting back tears since arriving at the hospital, but this was too much. He couldn't believe what he was hearing and buried his head in Melfina's shoulder. She did her best to comfort him. However, she was pretty close to tears herself. 

"...and there's nothing you can do?" Gene asked. 

"Like I said, we can keep her under observation in Intensive Care, but we can't hide the fact that she might never be able to use her legs again from her." 

"So she'll survive only to die...." Suzuka noted quietly and bitterly.   
  


There was hardly anybody in the hospital's cafeteria at this late hour, and Suzuka was surprised it was still open. She settled on a glass of tea from one of the vending machines and sat down by herself at one of the tables. 

"We meet again, Twilight Suzuka" 

She looked up from her glass of tea as a young man with close-cropped light brown hair pulled out the chair opposite her and took a seat. 

"I'm sorry- have we met?" Suzuka asked 

"Only very briefly. My name is Ceasar Dvorak." he said. "You killed a man named Nestor a few years back on Morenci 9. He was my father." 

It was slowly starting to come back to her. She was hired to take out two smugglers whom the then up-and-coming Singh brothers thought were skimming profits from their operations. The job stood out in her mind because of how badly it had gone. She had killed both of her targets, but on the first one she had gotten sloppy and left behind a witness. Now he had come back to haunt her. 

"Your father was a smuggler......." Suzuka stated, starting to remember the specifics of the job out loud. 

Ceasar misinterpreted that statement. "Don't you judge him! You killed him and you destroyed my family, you have no fucking right!" he quietly and angrily hissed. "My father had two kids to feed. He may have smuggled some contraband in his day, but he was a saint!" He regained his composure and reached into his coat, pulling out an old photo and handing it to Suzuka. 

The photo showed a tall, lanky blonde man with a widow's peak dressed in coveralls- it was Nestor a few years before Suzuka had killed him. Next to him was a boy close to Jim's age- obviously that was Ceasar. In the man's arm was a dark-haired little girl slightly younger than Ceasar in the photo, with the biggest smile of the 3 of them. Suzuka felt a knot in her stomach as she thought of her own family and Hitorika. 

He tapped a thumb next to the little girl's image. "That's Natalya. Momma died while giving birth to her, and my father never remarried. Natalya took Poppa's death very hard. She had so much promise and potential. We had to move into a tiny one-room apartment when he was gone. On her 17th birthday, she cut her wrists and left behind a note. Four words- 'Gone to see Daddy'." he sighed. "Now, do you understand why I'm here?" The two of them locked icy gazes from across the table. Suzuka nodded, but didn't blink. 

"And the Singh brothers?" she asked, trying to shift the attention away from Ceasar's family. 

"Dead." 

"All of them?" 

"Well, Johan was killed a few years ago trying to double-cross the Kei pirates." Ceasar said. "I took care of Hans and Nils the other night." That announcement caused Suzuka some concern. In her business dealings with them, it was apparent that Johan was the brains of the outfit, but Hans was very shrewd and cautious. Killing him must not have been an easy feat. He chuckled. "Can you believe they offered me 150,000 wong for killing you? They thought you were trying to extort them. I told Nils I would have gladly taken the job for free..... right before I shot him in the face." 

Suzuka was a little dismayed at hearing about the Singh brothers' offer to Ceasar. How ironic to survive in this line of work for so long only to get killed by your former employers. 

"Damn pirates- denying me all 3 of them. I understand they killed your family, too." 

Suzuka nodded. 

"I'm sorry to hear that." He remarked with a surprisingly sympathetic and sincere tone. "I doubt you really would have taken up this line of work if you still had your family, would you? God knows I wouldn't....I wanted to go into business for myself and maybe be a pilot like my father. I wonder, what did you want to do? You probably didn't wake up one morning and say 'Gee, I think I'll spend the rest of my life doing other people's dirty work for a pittance'. I mean a person would have to be genuinely fucked up if that were the case." Suzuka was quietly taken aback by how close to home his words hit. 

"Too bad about the pirates and your family. That means I won't get to kill them. By the way, how is the Ctarl woman doing?" 

"Just fine" Suzuka calmly bluffed as she took another sip of tea. 

"Really? From what I saw, she lost a lot of blood. For a Ctarl Ctarl to be bleeding that much....well, let's just say that I'm surprised she's 'just fine'. Did your father bleed that much?" 

Her eyes narrowed into angry slits. Ceasar was trying to provoke her, and it was almost working but for some reason she held herself back. She remembered using slightly different tactics to try and achieve the same thing with Hitorika. However, Ceasar was just getting started. "If it's me you want......" Suzuka started 

Ceasar let out a hearty chuckle. "Believe me, it is you I want, but not before I get to see you suffer like I did first. How good are you at coping with loss, Suzuka?" 

She knew what he was implying. "You leave them out of this or I'll....." 

"You'll do what? Kill me? Sometimes I wish you had killed me, Suzuka. Tell me, do you think you can protect ALL of them from me? You like gambling, don't you? Would you be willing to wager their lives on that?" 

Suzuka was starting to lose what remained of her cool. She could only hope that Ceasar hadn't picked up on this. "Darling Suzuka, I didn't know they all meant that much to you. I'll tell you what. I'll only kill one of them- but I get to choose. How about I put the Ctarl woman out of her misery? She really was hurting earlier tonight. They say they're immortal, but that's a matter of perception. Maybe the boy- But that's not very sporting, is it? I know- the redhead! Or are you two lovers....?" 

She turned away from him and hung her head. He was pushing all the right buttons to break Suzuka, and the worst part was that she could actually relate to how he felt. The rage and sheer helplessness that she thought was purged once she killed Hitorika had now come back tenfold. 

".....oh no- he doesn't know, does he? I'm so sorry. Are you going to tell him before it's too late?" She looked at him and wanted nothing more to leap across the table and run him through with the bokken, but when she looked at Ceasar she saw the distraught 18-year old cradling his father's body, pleading for her help, which in turn took her back to the day her family was murdered. The wooden sword felt like it weighed a ton. Her cool glaring exterior hardly betrayed it, but she with filled with an odd mixture of burning hatred and empathy. She thought the worst was over, but now this new life of hers was crashing down all around her. 

"Offer's on the table for the next ten seconds. 9...8...7...6...5...4...3...OK then, I guess I'll kill them all. Not now of course- I mean, I'm expected and that would be downright stupid! Good luck trying to stop me, Suzuka" 

He got up from the table and paused after taking a few steps away from her. "Don't worry- she's safe for now." he softly said to her as he walked past. He passed within a few inches of Gene on the way out of the cafeteriea. Without recognizing him, he gave Ceasar a casual glance before heading over to the table to talk to Suzuka. 

"Who was that?" Gene asked 

"An old acquaintance" Suzuka said without even looking up from the photo of the Dvorak family."I see." As far as Gene was concerned 'old acquaintance' was Suzuka-talk for another assassin. "Swapping trade secrets?" 

Suzuka was glad Aisha wasn't there- not that she was glad Aisha nearly bled to death earlier tonight. Still, Aisha's ears would've picked up every syllable of her conversation with Ceasar and left a lot of delicate questions to be asked in the most indelicate manner possible. 

"Something like that...." A shaken Suzuka said as she took another sip of tea. Like it or not, Gene- all of them- had to be told the truth. It was too subtle for anybody else to notice, but her hands were starting to tremble slightly.   
  


Aisha looked at her hands. They were so small. She was wearing her favorite orange dress that she outgrew so many years ago, and she was in her favorite tree in the meadow behind her family's house on the Ctarl Ctarl homeworld. Bright patches of sun were shining down on her through the leaves and branches. 

What's going on? She asked herself. She remembered the intruder grabbing Jim, then Gene and Melfina standing behind her and then nothing....how did she get back home? Was she dead? 

As she was asking herself these questions, Aisha lost her grip on the branch and fell to the ground. A nasty scrape appeared on her knee and began bleeding. She started crying loudly. Aisha remembered falling out of the same tree as a little girl and crying until her mother ran out to check on her. It wasn't unusual for a young Ctarl Ctarl whose skin was relatively soft to bleed, but that was the first time Aisha saw her own blood and she was scared. 

Young Aisha continued bawling. When she looked up, she saw Jim, Gene, Melfina and Suzuka standing a few feet away, looking at her with concern. She was speechless- what were they doing here? How did they get here? 

Melfina stepped forward and kneeled down next to the small Ctarl Ctarl girl, as if to answer her questions and allay her fears. 

"Don't be afraid..." Melfina said, speaking to her in a flawless Imperial Ctarl Ctarl dialect. 

Aisha's jaw dropped. She wanted to ask Mel where she learned to speak Ctarl Ctarl so well, but sensed that she had much more to say. 

Melfina placed her hand on Aisha's cut for a few seconds. Aisha looked down and to her surprise saw that the bleeding had stopped and the cut disappeared entirely. Mel gently pulled her hand away from Aisha's healed knee. 

"How did you....?" 

She held out her hand and helped the tiny Aisha to her feet. "That is not important" she continued in Ctarl Ctarl. "What is important is that you understand." 

"Understand?" 

"Yes. There are other paths for you to take, you must understand that." Melfina started walking away, rejoining the others. "When you leave this place, we will meet again." Jim and Gene waved goodbye while Suzuka demurely bowed her head before the four of them turned and left. 

She was so confused. Aisha silently pleaded with them to come back and tell her more, but the four of them disappeared into the tall, rippling, wind-blown grass in sunny meadow. 


	3. New Lease on Immortality?

"WHAT? You mean you actually talked to him? At the hospital?" Gene asked 

"Yes, he approached me and told me...." 

Gene wouldn't let Suzuka continue. "And you made no attempt to stop him? You didn't even try and warn us?" 

At Suzuka's urging, the four of them had left the hospital and returned to Starwind and Hawking building. They were packing up whatever they could, since just about any other place on Heiphong was safer than where they were right now. Gene had gotten Fred Luo out of bed with a pre-dawn phone call and convinced him to let them set up camp at his Heiphong offices. 

"No, it could have very well been a trap." she said 

"Well who the hell is this guy?" 

"He told me his name was Ceasar Dvorak. A few years ago, I was hired to kill a smuggler- a pilot named Nestor Dvorak. Evidently Ceasar is his son." Suzuka said, opting for the short and sweet version and leaving out how horribly botched she felt the job went and how she could have ended all of this before it started by killing Ceasar. Gene bristled at the mention of "kill", "pilot" and "son". 

"How did he find us?" Jim asked. His tears had gone away, but he was still very upset. 

Suzuka had poured herself another glass of tea as the others were packing. She didn't have much in the way of possessions at the building, aside from a few teapots and martial-arts texts, most of her belongings were kept on board the Outlaw Star. She demurely sipped before continuing. 

"It seems he was able to get some information about me from the men who hired me to kill his father. This address was probably among the information...." 

Gene was seething. He sensed Suzuka was holding back. To hear her talk about it wasn't much more different than hearing Ron McDougal talk about killing his father or Hilda. All that was missing was the dismissive "It was nothing personal". However, it was Jim who lost it first. 

Jim reached out and smacked the tea cup in Suzuka's hands as hard as he could. She let out a quiet, startled gasp and winced a bit as her fingers were bent backwards. Some tea had spilled onto the front of her kimono, and the cup went flying across the room before smashing into a hundred pieces against the wall. 

"DAMMIT! WHAT'S YOUR DEAL, LADY?" he yelled. Melfina put a hand on his shoulder and was gently trying to pull him back, but Jim was having none of it. "HOW MUCH LONGER WERE YOU GOING TO WAIT BEFORE TELLING US THIS? MAYBE WHEN ANOTHER ONE OF US IS DEAD?" 

"Jim- nobody's dying...." Melfina said softly, but she knew how unconvincing it sounded. 

Suzuka glared at the boy. Mel had pulled him back, but Jim continued. He was staring Suzuka back right in the eye. "She's DYING! All I can say is that if it were you that was dying, Aisha would be beside herself. In case you're not following current events, she threw herself on top of a bomb for us, and all you've done so far is sit on your ass and pour yourself tea. You're not the least bit concerned, are you? Sometimes I wonder which one of you two is more human....". Even though she knew he meant Aisha and Suzuka, Mel winced at that statement. 

"That's enough, Jim." Gene finally spoke up 

"Losing control of our emotions at a time like this is counterproductive- "Suzuka started to say, but the boy wasn't listening. He walked angrily off. 

The room was now filled with a deafening silence until Gene spoke up again. 

"For what it's worth, I agree with him." He didn't really want to dogpile on Suzuka, but it really did sound too much like Ron McDougal was speaking through her moments ago. Gene wouldn't admit it, but he was scared. He wasn't Aisha's biggest fan and probably never would be, but things just wouldn't be the same without her. Whatever scrapes he had gotten himself into these past few months, he did so knowing that the Strongest Woman in the Universe was on the same side. However tactlessly she phrased it, Aisha offered to look after things- including Jim- if anything were to happen to Gene. He never even considered the possibility that he would outlive an immortal Ctarl Ctarl. If she did leave, Gene always assumed it would be on her own accord to return to the Empire. Now the strongest woman in the Universe was lying crippled and sedated in the hospital, obligated to kill herself if and when she woke up, and that scared him shitless. 

"I understand now-" Suzuka said."I was good enough company while I was fighting the Kei pirates, but now I've outlived my usefulness to you people. Is that it?" 

"That's not what I meant and you know it." 

"Oh really, Gene? I never said I was proud of what I have done, but I refuse to make any excuses, either. I did what I had to in order to survive. What about the people you've killed? Tell me, how is that any different? I'm certainly not the only one in this room with blood on my hands." She felt like she was burning bridges with everybody at Starwind and Hawking, but this was something she had to get off of her chest. Melfina was silently pleading for them to stop. 

"GENE!" the 3 of them heard Jim yell out. They rushed upstairs and carefully approached the boy. He was crouched in front of the door to Suzuka's room, pointing at something. It turned out to be a tripwire, running at ankle height across the doorway. Gene slowly crouched down next to Jim to get a closer look at the trap. Connected to the wire and taped to one end of the door was a tin can with a grenade in it. 

Gene pulled out a knife from his pocket and slowly began running it up each side of the doorway, checking for even more traps. Jim, Melfina and Suzuka quietly backed away. As they were doing so, they heard a small *thud* and Gene whispered "Shit!". He set off the tripwire by accident and the grenade rolled out of the can. Instead of the muffled explosion that took out Aisha, there was a small burst of colorful confetti and a sudden whistling, like a New Year's noisemaker. The sides of the grenade had collapsed and there was a little rotating flag that said "Bang!" 

A warning. The four of them were too tense to heave a sigh of relief.   
  


Fred was happy to have company over, although the feeling wasn't mutual. He was also thrilled to learn that despite the fact that the ruthless saboteur/assassin Dvorak was zeroing in on Fred's friend and love interest, Dvorak had also taken care of some of his more serious competition. Jim was the only one who went to bed- the others were gathered around a pot of coffee in Fred's office. After brewing the pot of coffee, he excused himself. Even the perky, flirtatious merchant sensed the gravity of the situation and decided to leave well enough alone. 

"We can't stay here much longer." Gene said. 

"Agreed. As long as he knows where we are and what we're doing, he'll have the upper hand." Suzuka concurred. 

"Maybe we could go back to Sentinel for awhile" Mel suggested. 

"I imagine we wouldn't be any safer there than we would be here." the assassin said. "Ceasar Dvorak may not neccecarily a superior opponent, but as you could understand, he's very determined. That makes him even more dangerous." 

"But going back to Sentinel could buy us enough time to come up with a way to fight him on our terms, not his." Gene added. Too bad the brains of this outfit is fast asleep, he said under his breath. 

Suzuka nodded in agreement, she never said it was a bad idea, it just wasn't the long-term solution Melfina was hoping for. Nobody wanted to bring it up, but Gene finally asked "What are we going to do about Aisha?" 

"What can we do?" Suzuka asked. "We don't have much options. We can't leave her behind...." 

"Yeah, but if what the doctor says is true, we just can't let her kill herself, either" Gene said. He paused and was morbidly wondering about the logistics of a Ctarl Ctarl killing themselves. One of his sturdiest knives shattered after he tried running her through, and after being shot with a #12 shell she was alive, well and doing dishes a few minutes later. 

"I have an idea." Melfina spoke up 

"What is it Mel?" Gene asked 

She looked knowingly at Suzuka and then Gene. "Do you remember when the Kei pirates shot you with those poisoned needles on Sentinel?" she asked him. 

Suzuka and Gene exchanged glances. That wasn't a question so much as an answer on Melfina's part. "Of course!" Gene said "do you think it will work with...?" 

"It has that capacity, yes." she nodded "Muscle and nerve tissue can be rebuilt and healed once inside. But the nature of your injuries was quite different from hers. I've never tried it on a Ctarl Ctarl, but I don't see any reason why it wouldn't work. She is a registered crew member, and internally the Ctarl Ctarl aren't very different from humans." 

"Well, it certainly is a more viable option than watching her die." Suzuka said 

"But do you think Aisha will go for it?" he asked. None of them needed to be reminded of how proud and stubborn she could be. 

"I think she can be persuaded." Suzuka said.   
  


Jim went to sleep almost as soon as they arrived at Fred's place. However, it was only a few hours of fitful sleep. Each time he closed his eyes, he'd see Aisha looking up at him helplessly, blood trickling from the corner of her mouth and her lips moving without being able to form any words. He made up his mind he wouldn't cry anymore, but his mind conjured up the image of the crippled, bleeding, helpless Aisha instead of the cheerful, carefree Aisha that would tousle his hair or lecture him about how he worked too hard for somebody so young. Dawn had rolled around, and Jim gave up on any chances of getting more sleep. As he got up and finished getting dressed, he noticed a kimono-clad silhouette standing in the doorway. 

"What is it Suzuka?" he asked. He didn't have the energy to argue anymore. 

"I could really use your help James. We all could." 

"With what?" 

"We need you to go through any files on a Ceasar Dvorak that you might find. Hopefully you might be able to find a weakness that we could be able to exploit." 

Jim thoughtfully looked at the assassin. He sensed that she was scared, something that he had never sensed from her before. It wasn't that she feared for her own life, either. She said that she talked to Dvorak at the hospital last night. The man had threatened to take something away from her and was capable of carrying out those threats. 

"What did he say to you?" Jim asked. 

Suzuka blinked, surprised. It wasn't a change of topic, exactly. 

"He introduced himself and said he'd kill as many of you as he could before killing me." she said bluntly and without betraying much emotion. "He said he has his family to avenge, and I'm certain that he's doing this without any outside help." 

Jim was silent. He now quietly regretted his angry words to her last night, but she wasn't looking for an apology. He could never figure Suzuka out, but he remembered that she willingly took on the McDougal brothers, even though it certainly wasn't her fight. Now one of her old enemies was knocking on the door and so far, he and Gene had turned their backs on her. 

"About Aisha...." she spoke up 

"Huh?" 

"It may not look it, but I'm just as concerned as you are about her." 

The boy stammered "It's just that....first, I came so close to losing Gene and now....." 

Suzuka waved her hand as if to say "forget it.". She felt that he should hear some good news for a change. "Last night, Melfina came up with an idea. She might be able to help Aisha...." 

"You mean....?" Jim's eyes lit up. No further explanation was needed- he had been there. 

Suzuka nodded. 

"Do you think it will work? There's a big difference between poison and paralysis." he said. 

"It definitely is worth a try, don't you agree?" 

That morning, the 4 of them arrived at the hospital to find Aisha wide awake and very much bored in her hospital bed. She was reclining the bed back and forth when they walked in. 

"Aisha!" Jim yelled out enthusiastically and threw his arms around her. He had been expecting the worst, and although she looked somewhat haggard, it certainly was an improvement over last night. Not only that, she was awake and seemed like she was in good spirits. 

Aisha winced a little bit- she thought that one of her ribs was broken and sure enough, the boy had found it. Still, she smiled and tousled his hair. At least she still has plenty of upper-body strength, Jim thought to himself. 

"Hey Jim. What do you have there?" 

He reluctantly pulled away. In his right hand was a small bouquet of yellow roses 

"These...?" he asked "I got these..." he stopped and corrected himself "I mean... we- WE got these for you Aisha." Jim shuffled his feet and his face was starting to turn red as he handed them to her. 

Aisha looked at the others. Melfina nodded. It was Jim's idea and he paid for the roses himself at a small flower stand just outside the front of the hospital, but he wanted all of them to sign a card that came with the bouquet. Gene and Suzuka quietly nodded in agreement when they saw Jim start to blush. 

Aisha sniffed the bouquet and let out a little smirk. Without even taking her eyes off the beet-faced boy genius "I see. Well, they're very nice..." she paused, still looking directly at Jim "....~you guys~." 

"So how are you feeling?" Gene asked 

She crossed her arms, gingerly pulling the bouquet close to her chest. "I'm hungry and the food here is terrible and the portions are way too small. They're keeping me pumped full of tranquilizers, so I'm always tired. The doctors haven't told me anything yet- I guess they're afraid I'll turn into my beast form and go on a rampage, and I can't feel my legs." Reflexively she reached forward with one hand and started massaging her left leg. 

The four of them exchanged concerned looks. So far, what the doctor had told them earlier was true. Aisha didn't seem too bothered that there was no feeling in her legs. "What happened to me anyway?" she asked. 

"You don't remember?" Jim asked 

She shook her head "no". 

"You threw yourself on top of a powerful explosive device to protect the others, Aisha. The blast didn't kill you, but there was extensive damage to your spine, some nerves were severed. The doctors were afraid to tell you, but you may have lost the use of both legs." Suzuka said. She wasn't there, but she figured she should be the one to break the news to Aisha. 

"Wh...what?" her jaw dropped. Her relatively sunny demeanor had changed as she slumped and looked down. "I thought this was just temporary...." she was about to say something along the lines of 'nice knowing all of you' when she remembered the strange dream where Melfina was speaking to her in perfect Ctarl Ctarl. Her thoughts swung like a pendulum between getting ahold of her heirloom dagger in order to kill herself and Mel healing the cut on Aisha's knee in her dream. 

"Hey, if you hadn't done what you did Aisha, we would've been hamburger." Gene said, trying to cheer her up. It wasn't working, she wasn't paying any attention. 

"But for all we know, the doctors here could be wrong" Jim said, trying not to sound like too much of a Polyanna. "The first thing they told us was that they weren't set up to treat Ctarl Ctarl here, so you could easily be misdiagnosed". His words fell on deaf, pointy ears. 

"Did the doctor also tell you what I have to do if what you're saying is true?" she asked. 

They all nodded somberly. Jim wanted to tell Aisha to forget about Ctarl Ctarl tradition and tell her that she wouldn't be a burden at all, even if she couldn't walk. But he realized that she was proud enough that telling her to forsake Ctarl Ctarl customs would be like slapping her in the face. 

Melfina stepped closer to the bed. "It could be temporary. Before you do anything rash, there's something we might be able to do for you. Even if the doctors are right about your legs....." Aisha looked at her "There's something about the Outlaw Star that you don't know about." 

"Like what?" 

Since Aisha wasn't with them when the Kei pirates attempted to take away the XGP back on Sentinel, they told her about how Gene had been shot with poison needles and how Melfina was able to flush the poison from his blood in a matter of minutes. 

"You're saying you want me to get into the tube?" Aisha asked somewhat indignantly. 

All of them nodded "yes". 

"How do you know if it will work?" 

"We don't, but it's worth a shot don't you think?" Gene asked. 

Aisha knew about her paralysis long before any of them arrived. Nobody had told her, it was just intuition. She thought she would be able to accept it, but it was quite different hearing the bad news out loud for the first time. Before the 4 of them showed up, she had made up her mind to take her own life. Of course, just as she was obligated to take her own life, she was also obligated by tradition to write her family and each of them a farewell note. She thought she would put on a brave face when her friends came to visit because in the back of her mind she felt it would be one of the last times she'd ever see them. It was the only honorable thing to do now that her body was broken their assailant had escaped, and she vowed she wouldn't be talked out of it. One quick, deep thrust of the dagger into her right ear and it would all be over. But now she wasn't so sure. Humans were so sentimental- was this a lie on their part meant to keep her alive? Could she really be cured inside Melfina's tank? 

There are other paths for you to take, she remembered Mel saying in her dream. Aisha had written off the dream as a by-product of the sedatives and anesthesia she was given. But just like the dream, the four of them were looking at her with concern. Unconsciously, she found herself rubbing the tiny scar that had formed on her knee so many years ago when she fell out of the tree behind her home.   
  


Ceasar was back in his tiny apartment contemplating his next move. He knew where they kept the ship, there was no mistaking the distinct red vessel. Although he had his doubts about getting past the security on the Outlaw Star, he also knew that there was one small, enclosed area that all of them had to pass through before boarding. Security at the spaceport where they had docked at was pretty minimal, and even if they weren't leaving anytime soon, they'd have to get to the Outlaw Star sooner or later. Perhaps he could force their next move. The Ctarl woman was the biggest obstacle, and now with her out of the way he could operate on his timetable. He needed a way to separate Suzuka from the others. Ceasar unrolled the blueprints and took another sip of beer. He had been waiting almost 3 years for this, and if he showed some patience then this could work out perfectly. 

He smiled, thinking back to last night's meeting with Suzuka. She was almost an entirely different person compared to the silent assassin who left him with his father's corpse so many years ago. Last night, he did his best to provoke her, but she did nothing. It wasn't restraint that held her back- not entirely. She betrayed some emotion, even if only for an instant. He wouldn't go so far as to say that he had broken her spirit, but he sensed fear on her part- he could almost smell it.   
  


The consensus was that the 5 of them would be going back to Sentinel to at least buy some time. Nobody raised the possibility of Melfina's idea not working on Aisha because if it didn't, they'd be all out of options. Aisha reluctantly agreed to go inside Mel's tank, but moving her from the hospital to the XGP would also prove to be a fairly unique challenge. They wanted Aisha sedated while moving her, but the ones given to her that morning were starting to wear off. Suzuka came up with the idea of letting Aisha drink the contents of Gene's flask that he usually had with him- which turned out to be vodka that day. Melfina and Jim went to "liberate" a wheelchair as the Ctarl Ctarl made quick work of the flask, so Gene went out and got some more of the cheapest whiskey he could find. Ordinarily, Aisha didn't drink that much liquor but after such a small breakfast she felt she needed the calories. She went through the whiskey almost as quickly as she did most dinners and was a little bit tipsy when Gene handed over her 3rd bottle of whiskey that morning. 

"Now Gene, it doesn't matter how drunk you get me," she said, wagging her finger and slurring her speech a bit "my answer's still 'no'." 

Suzuka bit her lower lip, stifling a laugh. That remark came from out of nowhere, but she knew that Aisha wasn't referring to the tank. 

"Ha Ha Ha- Bite me, Aisha! I can't help myself. That paper gown of yours is making me sooooo hot!" the outlaw snapped at her. His ego was still reeling, but he supposed it was a good sign that she was still able to argue with him despite being in such bad shape. "Just don't come running to me when you develop a drinking problem!" 

Melfina and Jim returned with a wheelchair and everybody helped Aisha into it. Jim and Gene would go back to Fred's place to pick up some last minute supplies. Mel, Suzuka and Aisha would head straight over to the spaceport and the Outlaw Star from the hospital. Aisha was drifting in and out of conciousness, but she didn't change her mind after reluctantly agreeing to go inside the tank. Gene was reluctant to split up, but if they could evade the assassin that was stalking them for one afternoon, then they could buy themselves enough time to go to Sentinel and maybe spring a trap of their own.   
  


"Aniki?" Jim asked as the two of them were loading up some emergency rations for the ship generously given to them. Ehefrau was parked outside Fred's offices, and they were fitting as much as they could in the trunk. 

"Yeah?" 

"What if Melfina's idea doesn't work? What are we gonna do then?" 

"I haven't given that much thought." the older outlaw confessed to his younger partner. "I'm sure we'll come up with something." 

Jim looked at him with a hint of skepticism. "Don't sweat it Jim. Aisha would want you to be strong like an immortal Ctarl Ctarl for her sake...." He bit his tongue after realizing he blurted out the word "immortal". "Besides, how can it NOT work? Has Melfina ever let us down before?" he asked. 

The boy didn't dwell on Gene's gaffe. Instead, he did his best to focus on the task at hand. His mind was still racked with visions of Aisha paralyzed and coughing up blood. Still, there was something reassuring in his words.   
  


Aisha was now fully awake and sober inside the tank. Once she opened her eyes, she was afraid she'd drown or suffocate after being immersed in the liquid, but after a few seconds she realized that she didn't even need to breathe. Moving around the tank was almost like moving around in Zero gravity. Inside the tank, it was so tranquil and serene. She looked down and saw that she had nothing on- not her officer's uniform, not her nightie, not that stupid paper gown from the hospital, not her bell, not even any bandages. She became aware that there was somebody in the tank with her. 

Mel was floating behind Aisha- she couldn't get over how petite the Ctarl Ctarl was. She had proven time and again how strong she was, yet Aisha was actually an inch or so shorter than Melfina. It must have been the way Aisha carried herself that made Mel believe the Ctarl Ctarl was taller. Aisha looked down and saw an eerie, ethereal glow around the scars that had formed on her chest and belly. She was aware that Melfina was in there with her. 

"What's happening?" Aisha asked nervously. It didn't hurt, but it almost went without saying that this was unlike anything she had ever seen before. 

"Your body is being healed." Melfina said. 

"How.....? Why?" she had so many questions. For some reason, she wanted to know if she could navigate the ship from there. Aisha noticed that the scar tissue was slowly shrinking and became aware of a tingling sensation in her legs, as if they both had been asleep for awhile and the sensation was just starting to return. 

"You know why. We're not giving up on you that easily." Mel said, looking at her still-shrinking scars. She could sense that in the back of her mind, Aisha still felt that she had failed all of them by letting their assailant escape. Melfina saw it quite differently. Mel wanted Aisha to know that if she hadn't put herself in harm's way like that, then neither Gene, herself or Jim would be alive. Without saying another word, the loud, boisterous Ctarl Ctarl and the timid, reserved bio-android had reached an understanding.   
  


The two of them stepped out of the tank. Mel was already in her skirt, blouse and blue coat, but Aisha was still in her birthday suit. Strangely, both of them were bone-dry after being immersed inside of the tank. The only sign that Aisha was injured in the first place was a faint 2-inch scar that curved diagonally around her waist. Suzuka was standing by the tank with an extra officer's uniform that Aisha kept in her quarters on board. After looking down at her newly-healed body, she walked over to Suzuka and started putting the uniform on. A faint smile was on Suzuka's face as she watched Aisha walk under her own power. She donned the dress, leather panels, scarf and bell and immediately started punching and kicking at the air with a few warm-up karate moves. 

"As good as new!" she said excitedly. 

Melfina smiled. She wasn't expecting any verbal thanks on Aisha's part- that much was obvious since their first encounter at Blue Heaven. To a Ctarl Ctarl, those were nothing more than empty words. Instead, she noticed that Aisha preferred to let her actions reflect her gratitude or whatever emotion she was feeling. She and Suzuka were very much alike in that respect. 

Aisha's ears twitched as she walked past the hatch. She heard the hum of the elevator ascending. 

"Are we expecting anybody?" the Ctarl Ctarl asked 

"Gene and Jim said they'd be coming by" Melfina said 

Aisha's eyes widened a bit and she opened up the hatch. 

"What is it Aisha?" Suzuka asked. 

Aisha sniffed the air as she stepped out of the hatch. Her teeth were clenched and she let out a soft growl. 

"I recognize that scent. He's here." She announced. 

Jim and Gene looked up as the laoding elevator on the Outlaw Star's launch pad stopped just shy of the catwalk leading to the hatch. 

"Shit!" Gene said as he continued tapping the button in vain. The elevator wasn't moving. However, both of them heard a noise coming from the roof of the car. It sounded like footsteps. Somebody was on top of the car. Who? Gene drew his pistol. He would've opened fire, but he couldn't see his target- only hear it. Then the noise stopped. Both of them were filled with a sinking feeling as they realized that they were now trapped in a tiny metal box one hundred feet off the ground. 


	4. Laying in Wait

"Melfina- stay inside." Suzuka said as she and Aisha stepped outside. If worse came to worse, they might need her again, but it was best not to think like that. As the hatch closed, a voice spoke up. 

"Hello again, Suzuka. I've been waiting for you and your friends all day." Ceasar said as he hopped off the top of the elevator car and got onto the walkway. The elevator was stuck with just over half of the car on the same level on the catwalk. That was by design on Ceasar's part. He needed to keep the car and his hostages to be close enough to serve as a distraction while getting him up to the platform. 

The assassin and Ctarl Ctarl glared at him as he continued walking. 

"Nice ship you have here." 

Both of them realized that Ceasar had a death wish. Aisha was more than happy to oblige as she closed the distance between herself and him with her usual agility and speed. He made no attempt to back away or defend himself. She grabbed Ceasar by the collar, eager to avenge her injury. 

"I've placed a charge on the elevator." He matter-of-factly announced loud enough for both Suzuka and Aisha to hear him. "It goes off on 60 seconds....make that 53 seconds. That is, unless I push this button first." He pointed to a button on his watch. "As good as you are, I don't think you can kill me before I push a button. Me or your little friends, pussycat. What's it going to be?" 

She shoved him and pinned him up against the railing, growling the whole time. Aisha was furious beyond words, but had enough restraint to sense another trap. 

"Tick tick...." he said, pointing at his watch. 

"AISHA!" Suzuka yelled out. "Go take care of Gene and Jim- let me handle this." 

Aisha was in no mood to argue. She roughly shoved Ceasar towards Suzuka, and ran towards the stricken elevator. In his rig, aside from some remote controls to set off the charges he had placed, there was also a machete, a battle-axe and a dozen knives. Ceasar calmly walked towards Suzuka, passing a pair of reflectors that he had set up the other night while posing as a spaceport maintenance man. The reflectors were in turn connected to two strips of small but potent explosive charges that ran underneath the walkway about 3 meters apart. It was very discreet, and nobody besides him seemed to notice. He continued walking- Suzuka was waiting for him.   
  


"Last floor- everybody off!" Aisha said as she effortlessly ripped open the elevator doors. At the sight of her, Jim's eyes lit up as though a great burden was just removed from him. Aisha pulled the two of them from the stopped elevator. 

"Looks like somebody's feeling a little better." Gene said with a wry grin. He would have thanked her, but there were more pressing matters at hand. Besides, Aisha being Aisha, Gene imagined he would be hearing about this later on. 

"You're a sight for sore eyes..." Jim said. 

Aisha let out a satisfied "Hmmph!" and flexed the muscles on her right arm. "Honestly, I don't know how you people would survive without me!" She said. 

As the 3 of them were getting to their feet, there was a loud BOOM from the top of the elevator. They all covered their ears as the elevator that Gene and Jim were on only a few seconds ago shuddered and then plummeted over one hundred feet to the ground.   
  


Suzuka charged at him, bokken raised. She was hoping to finish this quickly with a Hi'an variant #2, but also knew that Ceasar was no fool. Instead of running straight at her, he leapt up on the railing to her right, grabbed the support girder and swung around as she ran past- his right leg missing the back of her head by half an inch. Suzuka turned around and tried catching him with a broad sweep of her sword as he hopped back down on the walkway. Suzuka's wooden sword hit the metal girder, resulting in a loud *clang* as lacquered wood met metal. As she pulled away the sword, he stepped closer to her and smacked her right on the nose using the heel of his hand. She took a step backwards, still holding onto the sword. 

"Opening up with a finishing move? You're insulting me. I'm very disappointed in you, Suzuka" 

Ceasar didn't place a lot of explosive in the elevator shaft, just enough to sever all of the cables and send the car falling. It did it's job beautifully, but he saw that the bounty hunter and the boy had been pulled off by the Ctarl woman. He silently cursed himself- 60 seconds was entirely too much time now that the Ctarl woman was healthy, but there was no way he could take her into account after their first encounter. No matter, he still had a few more tricks up his sleeve. Suzuka was momentarily distracted by the loud explosion- he saw an opening and kneed her just below the ribs and grabbed her by the shoulders. He knew that if they separated and she were able to use her bokken, it would be all over. He couldn't hold her off forever. She sensed this also, but as she made a fist and was ready to strike with her right hand, Ceasar grabbed her left. Suzuka felt a sharp white-hot pain and then a warm liquid spill over her right hand. She didn't cry out until she saw the hilt of one of Ceasar's knives sticking out from her hand. The blade had gone clean through Suzuka's left hand and was embedded in the railing, pinning her hand to it. Her bokken clattered to the ground as she absently tried pulling the knife from the railing with her free hand. She was losing a lot of blood. 

Ceasar had actually stepped back, losing himself in the moment and admiring Suzuka's agony like a master artist would admire his latest painting. 

"So the legendary Twilight Suzuka does bleed after all...." he said. He was about to close in and say more when a single shot rang out. 

Both Suzuka and Ceasar were lined up in Gene's sights almost as soon as he got off of the elevator, but he held his fire for fear of hitting Suzuka. Still, he kept his pistol trained on him, hoping that they would separate before he could do any harm to Suzuka. He saw him stab Suzuka in the hand before stepping back and squeezing off a shot. 

Ceasar glanced behind him as the bullet ricocheted off of the Outlaw Star's hatch. In one swift movement, he pulled a battle-axe from his overcoat and threw it at Gene. There was a loud CLANG as the axe-blade buried itself in a metal support girder 2 inches from Gene's left ear. Aisha stepped protectively in front of Jim in case Ceasar tried throwing any bladed weapons in their direction, But before he could, Gene aimed for center-mass on Ceasar. More shots rang out as Gene emptied the clip; Ceasar's body jerked from the impact of the rounds and he dropped to one knee, clutching his chest. Gene imagined that he would catch hell from Suzuka later on about interfering with her fight and damaging her pride but this involved all of them and if he didn't do something, there wouldn't be a "later". 

"Suzuka- are you all right?" Gene shouted as he started running forward. Aisha and Jim were several paces behind him as they started following. Ceasar was still on one knee as he turned and flashed a somewhat malevolent smile at Suzuka. Then he pulled out a tiny remote control and flipped a switch. Ceasar was about to play his trump card. 

"Gene....look out!" Suzuka yelled. 

Nothing happened for a split second after Ceasar flipped the switch, but as Gene stepped between two inconspicuous reflectors on the catwalk, there was an audible click followed by a deafening explosion a split-second later. The walkway started to give under Gene's feet, and out of desperation, he lunged at the intact surface of the catwalk in front of him. 

Aisha and Jim were far enough behind so that they managed to avoid plunging to the ground, but the catwalk on their side began to buckle violently and give way. The two of them slid forward as their end of the walkway came to rest almost vertically. Aisha grabbed onto a railing with one hand and caught Jim's wrist with her free hand as he slid by. She held onto it tightly. 

"Gotcha!" She said, more to reassure herself than anything. "Hang on Jim...". 

The walkway between the elevator and Outlaw Star was now cut in half, with Jim and Aisha on one side and Suzuka and Ceasar on the other. A specially shaped charge was placed on the sides of the catwalk so that the explosive force would be facing away from the ship. Jim was busy telling himself not to look down and hoping he could live long enough for a change in underwear.   
  


"GENE!" Suzuka yelled out, forgetting about the knife through her hand. 

"That's it, Suzuka! Let it all out!" Ceasar said with a big grin. Looking at the collapsed portion of the catwalk "Poor bastard. He'll never know how much you....." his sentence was cut short by a sweeping kick from Suzuka to his chest. It wasn't the most effective move on her part, but it was the best she could do with her lack of mobility. Ceasar staggered a few steps backwards and caught his breath. 

"BITCH!!" he yelled, pulling another knife from a sheath underneath his coat. He ran up and pressed it against her long, slender throat. 

"Getting a bit careless, aren't we?" Suzuka said with a defiant smile. She closed her eyes and anticipated the killing blow, but nothing happened. 

Ceasar suddenly blinked and lowered the knife. He stepped to her side, leaned in and gently whispered in her ear "You're not getting off that easy. I still have more of your friends to kill. Where's the bio-android? Can she come out and play? I wonder- does she bleed blood, or maybe oil? Just think, if you killed me when you had the chance, you wouldn't have to be going through all of this now". Ceasar stepped away. Adding more insult to injury, he picked up her sword. "What is the great Twilight Suzuka without her bokken?" 

"The same as you without your explosives and knives, I imagine" She said through clenched teeth. 

"True..." he nodded "But at this point, it's academic." He threw it down the walkway, where it bounced off of the dangling portion of the catwalk and fell out of sight.   
  


Both Jim and Aisha looked up when they heard a loud noise above them. At first, each of them thought it was their end of the catwalk finally giving way and about to come crashing down with them . Then they saw something sliding down towards them. Without giving it much thought, Jim grabbed for it as it slid by. It was Suzuka's sword. 

"Nice catch!" Aisha remarked before looking back up. 

"I was going to tell you the same thing." He wriggled his fingers on his right hand, just to see if he could still do it. Aisha was holding onto his wrist so tightly that it was cutting off the circulation. Better that then her letting go, he thought. He was worried. Suzuka without her bokken would be like Gene going into a life-or-death fight without a Caster. This can't be a good sign. 

Suzuka and Ceasar were still locked in their staring contest when they heard a noise. Suzuka had assumed the worse for Gene, Jim and Aisha. However, there was movement from the now-severed walkway and both of them looked. All that was visible was a pair of hands, a pistol being tightly gripped in one of them. Both of them knew what this meant. A smile momentarily crept across Suzuka's face when Ceasar wasn't looking, but it didn't last. 

"Shit!" Ceasar said quietly as he turned his attention away from Suzuka and headed over towards the severed end of the walkway. Gene was tenaciously holding onto the very end of the platform. As he was struggling, he felt a weight slowly and deliberately crushing his left hand- the one holding onto the empty gun. Gene looked up and saw Ceasar's boot stepping down on his left hand. 

"You're still alive, huh?" He was grinding his boot into Gene's hand until he released his grip on the pistol. 

Gene's eyes widened. He shot Ceasar, he knew he did, he couldn't miss him from that range. He saw the bullets impact, he wasn't a Tao-master and he sure as hell didn't have a light shield, yet he wasn't even bleeding. 

"Well now, you look quite surprised to see me, don't you?" Ceasar unbuttoned his coat and tapped a thick vest, with half a dozen small holes in the midsection. "Good old fashioned kevlar body armor, comrade. I should just be glad you didn't aim for the head!". He kicked the pistol over the edge. As he did this, he saw some movement on the other side of the walkway. The boy and the Ctarl woman were still alive, too. Killing them from his side would be a bit more difficult- he could try tossing a small charge over there to send the rest of the walkway crashing down....this was going to be a little harder than he thought. He was pondering his options when he heard the hatch of the Outlaw Star open up.   
  


Melfina didn't have it in her for life-or-death combat, but she could no longer stand sitting quietly in the Outlaw Star as Gene and the others were sitting ducks for the intruder to pick off whenever he felt like it. She and Gilliam were following the unfortunate series of events the best they could on the ship's monitor. For once, Suzuka seemed like she was outmatched. Aisha had regained the use of her legs only to be rendered helpless by the blast. Now she and Jim were hanging on by a slender thread, and she feared the worst for Gene. Gilliam halfheartedly protested as she stepped out of the hatch. Ceasar had his back to her, and she was going to run to Gene's aid when she saw the pool of blood on the walkway. Suzuka was still struggling to remove the knife from her hand and stay conscious. Melfina couldn't ignore her, and she began helping Suzuka pull the knife from the railing. It was pretty difficult to remove a metal blade that was stuck in a metal surface, but the 2 of them were able to get the blade to budge. Suzuka winced and let out a sharp gasp as the knife was finally removed from her hand. Melfina removed her overcoat and tore off a strip, wrapping it around Suzuka's injured hand. 

"Go.....Gene's over...." Suzuka said breathlessly, pointing to Ceasar and Gene. 

Melfina didn't need any more prompting than that. 

"GENE!!!" She cried out as she started running to him. In the back of her mind she was aware that Ceasar was standing between her and Gene. She had no idea what to do, but she just couldn't stand quietly watching, waiting for those closest to her to die.   
  


Jim's young life was still flashing before his eyes when it was interrupted by a triumphant "Hah!" from Aisha and he felt the two of them pull closer to the support girders. 

"Jim? Do you still have Suzu's sword?" she asked 

"Uh-huh" 

"Good. Now, get ready to climb onto my back." 

He looked up and saw that Aisha was able to get her footing on the support girders. Looking further up, he saw that Aisha meant to climb the now vertical girders like a ladder until they reached the intact portion of the walkway on their side. She strained a little bit as she lifted him up. He was able to wrap his one free hand around her shoulder as she began climbing up. While Aisha's attention was focused on the climb, Jim was able to stop himself from laughing and saw out of the corner of his eye that Gene was clinging to the edge of the opposite end of the catwalk. He also could have sworn he heard Melfina.   
  


Ceasar heard Melfina call out and turned around. He raised his knife, ready to slash the bioandroid's throat as she ran past.....except she looked familiar. As she came closer with each step, Ceasar became convinced that Melfina was really somebody else. He had never seen her close up before. Ceasar lowered the knife as tears of joy welled up in his eyes- how was this possible? After all these years, how could this be? 

"Natalya...?" 

Melfina saw him lower the knife, but instead of letting her run past, Ceasar caught her and wrapped her up in a big bear hug....almost as if he knew her somehow. 

"Oh my God! Natalya! How....? I thought I had lost you forever....." he said. "I missed you so very much!" 

Melfina struggled, but couldn't get out of his bear-hug. Yet, for some strange reason she didn't sense any malice on Ceasar's part. 

"Please...Let me go" Melfina pleaded in a surprisingly calm tone. 

"I'm sorry....it's just that it's been so long. I was afraid I'd never see you again Natalya." Melfina backed away, but Ceasar still had his hands firmly on her shoulders. 

Suzuka was closing the distance, ready to continue hand-to-hand fighting with Ceasar; his two hands versus her one good hand. But for some reason she stopped. She remembered the photograph that Ceasar had given her in the hospital, it was still in a pocket of her kimono. She pulled it out and studied it. The smiling, dark-haired girl in Nestor's arms, Natalya, Ceasar's sister whom he said had committed suicide when she was 17. The girl in the photograph could easily have been Melfina if she were a decade younger. Ceasar Dvorak was now convinced that he had been reunited with his late sister. The resemblance was uncanny. 

Besides not having the stomach for life-or-death combat, Melfina didn't really have it in her to lie or be dishonest. Yet, as Ceasar held her close something told her to play along and humor him. A tear ran down his cheek as he brushed a lock of her dark hair from her forehead. 

"Please...." Melfina said calmly. "No more killing." 

"I'm so sorry Natalya. If I thought for a second that you were still alive, I would not have done this." he was on the brink of tears "I wouldn't have wasted my life like this. You and I always were so different. Even if you were gone, I knew you wouldn't have approved of what I've done. You'd want me to forgive the ones that killed poppa, but I just can't." 

"Killing won't bring him back." Melfina heard herself say. 

"I know, but I'm afraid it's a little bit too late for me. I have to finish what I started- you must be very disappointed in me." He sighed and held Melfina closer "I've done things that I'm ashamed of. But you.....you've grown up so nicely, and wherever poppa is, I'm sure he's proud of you. God knows I am. You're everything I'm not- so calm, forgiving, gentle, understanding. I wish I could have been more like you sometimes, but it's too late...." 

"Please don't talk that way." Melfina said. She had gently broken away from Ceasar and was now starting to pull Gene up from the edge. Much to everybody's surprise, Ceasar grabbed Gene's other arm and helped Melfina pull him up. Gene was still on the ground and was about to say something to Melfina when Ceasar sharply kicked him in the ribs. There was an audible crack from his ribs, although Ceasar held back in kicking Gene back over the edge of the disconnected catwalk. 

"NO!" Melfina cried. "What are you doing?" 

"I'm sorry" Ceasar said a bit sheepishly. "But he did try shooting me. Don't worry, I'm sure he'll live". He then glanced at the beautiful assassin who was cautiously moving forward. Ceasar quickly looked at her. For her, there would be no mercy. 

He put his hands on Mel's shoulder's again and said "There's one more thing I must do. I have to finish this, I've done some things to some unforgiving people- I don't want to involve you." Mel realized that he was no longer calling her Natalya. Ceasar had slowly come to the understanding that he was no longer talking to his sister, but his demeanor didn't change at all. "Sorry." he said, looking into her eyes "You look so real. It's just that you remind me a lot of somebody I once knew. Somebody very close to me....." he trailed off. Was this the bio-android? he asked himself. How could it be? She didn't just look like Natalya, from what he saw she also had the exact same personality traits. 

"Please don't." Mel said. She saw that Suzuka was in no shape to fight him and thought that as long as Ceasar continued talking to her, there could be a peaceful way out of this. Even if it started out being misplaced, there was still a glimmer of sincerity in the saboteur/assassin's eyes and his soothing, affectionate words to her. She was catching a glimpse of the person he was before he had settled on his current trade. Ceasar wanted to give her a brotherly lecture about staying away from low-lifes such as himself since they would only break her heart, but there just wasn't enough time. 

"I have to. Forgive me." he kissed her cheek and tightly squeezed her as if to say good-bye. "There was so much I wanted to ask you.....Please, don't ever change-" 

He turned and faced the wounded assassin.   
  


Aisha and Jim were watching the turn of events from their end of the walkway. The elevator was gone, so there was no way down. With a running head start, Aisha could've jumped the gap that had been blown in the catwalk and joined the fray but she was reluctant lo leave Jim all alone and unarmed. Their assailant had grabbed Melfina and Aisha's ears picked up that for some reason, he was calling her Natalya. Suzuka didn't look very good, and Gene was still dangling from the other end of the walkway. What's his deal? Aisha wondered. He had the upper hand but wasn't finishing off any of them. 

These Terrans sure love to talk at the worst possible time, she said to herself. From what she could hear, he wasn't even toying with them, just calmly talking to Melfina. Both of them were quite surprised and a little relieved to see him help Melfina pull Gene up from the edge, although a little bit dismayed to see him kick Gene in the ribs. After seeing him talk to Melfina again, he had turned his attention to Suzuka. 

"Jim- let me see that." She said, grabbing the sword away from the boy. Jim didn't raise too much of a fuss. He was too busy watching events unfold on the other end of the walkway. Aisha gently tossed the sword up and down in her hand, looking thoughtfully at it.   
  


Melfina put her hand on Ceasar's shoulder in one final, quiet plea for him to stop fighting, but he walked away from her. She realized the die was cast and that there was nothing more she could do for him. Behind her, Gene was on the ground, groaning and coughing up some blood. She went to him. 

"YOU!" He yelled at Suzuka. Ceasar pulled another knife out of it's sheath and wound up to throw it at Suzuka. "I still have my family to avenge." 

"Likewise, Ceasar..." Suzuka said quietly between sharp breaths. She was no longer referring to her blood relatives. 

She may have had only one good hand, but she was quick enough to dodge the knife that flew her direction and embedded itself in the Outlaw Star's hatch. Suzuka moved forward and felt something tug at her kimono. Another throwing knife ripped it's way through the fabric below her right arm before it too was stuck in the hatch. The two of them ran at each other- Suzuka spun her left leg out and tried kicking Ceasar's feet out from under him, but he was able to catch himself on the guardrail and regain his balance. But before he could turn away or reach for another knife, Suzuka hit him in the face as hard as she could with her wounded hand. It wasn't a very strong blow, but that move had caught him off-guard enough to stagger a few steps backwards. However, it hurt her almost as much as it did him. Her back was turned to Gene, Melfina and the yawning gap blown in the walkway when she heard a familiar voice coming from the other side. 

"SUZU! CATCH!" Aisha yelled out. 

Suzuka smiled at the sound of that. As much as she professed to have hated it, she never thought she'd be so glad to be called 'Suzu'. She didn't even have to turn around to know that Jim was still alive, too. Aisha pitched the bokken across the gap like a javelin , having the foresight to throw it with the handle facing away from her. Nobody seemed to notice that Jim had his fingers crossed and was clenching his teeth as the sword seemed to be suspended in mid-air for an impossibly long time. Suzuka reached forward and barely caught it with her good hand. 

Ceasar was leaning against the railing, catching his breath after that unexpected blow from Suzuka's bad hand. Although he wasn't sure if it was his or Suzuka's, he wiped some blood from his face. He saw that she now had her bokken back. 

"Ah! I see you have your crutch once again!" he smiled. 

She grabbed onto the bokken as best she could "To kill them, you'll have to go through me first.". 

"Getting there is half the fun, Suzuka!" He made it clear that he was through playing around, leveled his machete and charged her. Suzuka saw that he was intending to thrust. Summoning the last of her strength, she charged him, raised her bokken and brought it down in one rapid stroke as they closed in on each other. There was a gust of wind and both of their movements were lost in a flurry of slashes and jabs. Suzuka collapsed almost immediately. Ceasar staggered a few steps forward, and found himself standing over Melfina. 

"Good-bye...." he whispered softly to her and then fell onto the floor, dying. 

Melfina looked at the fallen bodies of Ceasar and than Suzuka. She was too stunned to do anything until she saw faint movement from Suzuka. Her fingers were twitching and she was trying to move her right arm. Before Melfina could reach her, Suzuka slowly got to her feet and leaned against the railing. Her white kimono was smeared with blood- most of it from her hand. She had momentarily blacked out from blood loss, but was back on her feet. Off in the distance, sirens were wailing and steadily getting closer. That was the last thing Suzuka remembered before blacking out again. 

After another night at the Odessa Casino, Suzuka returned to the Starwind and Hawking building. Another night had passed, and still she faced a somewhat uncertain future. However, there wasn't the dark and ominous shadows cast over this like there was with Ceasar or Hitorika. The manager was interested in the possibility of adding her to the full time security staff at her current salary- a fairly tempting offer. 

She returned fairly early for a change, and most of the others were still up. Melfina was washing dishes and quietly greeted her as she walked in- she seemed to be pouting for some reason. Gene was at the table, looking through a magazine that was advertising spare parts for his Caster. Jim was busily typing away at the computer, stopping every now and then to massage his temples, and Aisha was curled up on the sofa- fast asleep with an empty pizza box, some candy wrappers and a large, empty bottle of Tobasco sauce by the foot of the sofa and a very content look on her face. The bouquet they had given her in the hospital was in a vase on a small table in front of the sofa as well as the little card. 

"Anything happen while I was out?" Suzuka asked 

"Not really. We're still waiting for a halfway decent job offer to come in. Mel made veal for dinner tonight, but I made the mistake of telling her where it came from. Now we'll probably never have veal again." he chuckled. 

"Those poor little cows!" Melfina said from the kitchen in an unusually loud tone. 

"Jim and sleeping beauty there had a belching contest after dinner" Gene continued, pointing to Aisha. "Poor little Jimmy never stood a chance". Jim gave him a dirty look out of the corner of his eye before turning his attention back to the computer. 

Before he was killed, Suzuka's father had once told her "If you have nothing you're willing to fight for, then you have nothing". She was remembering this as she peeled off the bandage. She could barely move her hand and had been keeping it in an improvised sling for the past few days. Suzuka winced as the last of the blood-clotted gauze came off. The fact that there was pain in her hand was a good sign, and the chances of getting infected decreased with each passing day. So far, she relied on good old fashioned holistic herbs to help with healing her hand, and it seemed to be working. The wound made by Ceasar's knife would be felt for a long time, but she felt fortunate that was all the damage he was able to inflict on her. She mused over her father's words as she applied some aloe to her wound. It hurt like hell, but her father was absolutely right. The slowly healing hole in her hand was a fairly small price to pay to keep her new home.   
  


THE END   
  


***Well, what did you think? If you've made it this far, please be so kind as to write a review.*** 


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